Activity and practice of nuclear cardiology in the Czech Republic, 2001

Abstract

Radionuclide myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) has been on the rise in Europe and the USA. Details on nuclear cardiology in the Czech Republic are not available as yet, as it is impossible to obtain comprehensive data from official registers owing to different methods of reporting and data evaluation. A questionnaire concerning nuclear cardiology activity and practice in 2001 was sent to all nuclear medicine departments in the Czech Republic. All 48 departments completed the questionnaire. In 2001, 50 planar and 54 tomographic (SPET) scintillation cameras were used. The average age of the SPET cameras was 5 years (13% of SPET cameras were >8 years old). Out of the 48 centres, 39 (81%) provided a nuclear cardiology service; the total number of cardiological studies was 15,740 in 2001 (1.5 studies/1,000 population/year). The most frequently employed method was MPI (81.7%), the frequency of which had increased by 10% compared with 2000; 26 of the 39 (67%) departments reported that MPI activity was increasing. Nevertheless, the Czech Republic nuclear cardiology activity remained below the European average (2.2/1,000 population in 1994) and, particularly, below activity in the USA (15/1,000 in 1997). The activity was rather unevenly spread. Whereas two centres with >1,000 studies/year accounted for 20% of the total MPI studies, 16 of 39 (41%) departments exhibited low activity (<200 studies/year) and accounted for only 15% of the total MPI studies. The use of SPET increased from 91% in 2000 to 94% in 2001 (only three institutes performed planar examinations). The most widely used tracer was (99m)Tc-MIBI (60% of total MPI), followed by (201)Tl (21%) and (99m)Tc-tetrofosmin (19%). ECG-gated SPET was employed by 20/39 (51%) centres, of which 11 (28%) performed it as a standard examination; 39% of the total MPI studies included this technique. Thirteen percent (5/39) of the departments used attenuation correction, and 69% (27/39) of the departments used a prone projection. Equilibrium radionuclide ventriculography, with 2,317 examinations (14.7%), ranked second among all nuclear cardiology methods, followed by first-pass angiocardiography (406 studies, 2.6%) and (18)F-FDG (163 studies, 1%).

Role of Prone SPECT Myocardial Perfusion Imaging in Patients with Equivocal or Abnormal Supine Myocardial Perfusion SPECT

“…It is also found from the study that males were more prone to coronary artery diseases which are matched from previous study reported by Samad et al for male preponderance. Literature review also revealed that young female patients have lower mean value for coronary artery disease due to estrogen protective effects [7].…”

Advances in myocardial perfusion and left ventricular function imaging using single photon emission tomography

“…Zavedení techniky gated SPECT, kterou v současnosti považujeme při zobrazování perfuze myokardu za standard, 1,2 kopírovalo v České republice vývoj v USA i v Evropě (obrázek 5). [3][4][5][6][7] Od roku 1998 jsou nukleárně kardiologické programy rovněž využívány k automatické kvantifi kaci rozsahu a závažnosti perfuzní abnormality pomocí segmentárního skórovacího systému. Významně se také mění spektrum pacientů odesílaných na vyšetření touto metodou.…”

“…[5][6][7][8] Rovněž v České republice je SPECT myokardu s počtem cca 17 000 vyšetření ročně nejčastější zátěžovou zobrazovací metodou. 3,6,7 V posledních deseti letech byly původně jednodetektorové SPECT kamery postupně nahrazovány dvoudetektorovými kamerami s variabilním uspořádáním detektorů (obrázek 1). Lze tak za stejnou dobu nastřádat dvojnásobnou hustotu impulsů a získat významně kvalitnější gated SPECT obrazy.…”